While the transmission bandwidth rate across computer networks continues to grow, the amount of data being transmitted is growing even faster. Computer users desire to transmit and receive more data in an equivalent or shorter time frame. The current bandwidth constraints may limit this ability to receive more data in less time as data and time, generally, are inversely related in a computer networking environment. One particular type of data being transmitted across the various computer networks is a video signal represented by a series of frames. The limits on bandwidth also limit the frame rate of a video signal across a network which in turn lowers the temporal picture quality of the video signal being produced at the receiving end.
Applying real-time frame interpolation to a video signal increases the playback frame rate of the signal which in turn provides a better quality picture. Without requiring an increase in the network bandwidth, frame interpolation provides this increase in the frame rate of a video signal by inserting new frames between the frames received across the network. Applying current real-time frame interpolation techniques on a compressed video signal, however, introduces significant interpolation artifacts into the video sequence. Therefore, for these and other reasons there is a need for the present invention.